PM/AM: Kindle Unlimited vs the Library

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Welcome to PM/AM, Popular Mechanics' morning briefing on the top science and tech stories for today.

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When I heard about Amazon's recent announcement about its subscription streaming service, Kindle Unlimited, I was thrilled. I already subscribe to Spotify for music, Netflix for TV and movies, and I love reading books on my Kindle. This seemed like the next logical step in my slow march toward streaming everything.

But before jumping in to another subscription, I wanted to make sure Kindle Unlimited was worth $9.99/month. I belong to the New York Public Library, and often check out e-books to my Kindle. The only problems I have with the library system are the standards: sometimes the book I want is already checked out and sometimes I don't read fast enough to finish the book before I have to check it back in. Since the library is free, I can't really complain.

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Wondering how Kindle Unlimited and the library matched up, I searched for ten books from my Goodreads "to read" bookshelf to see whether any of these sites carried books I'd read. I decided to include other book streaming services like Oyster and Scribd to see if they were any better or worse. My search is in no way scientific, but from this small sample size, I'll stick with my library card — Kindle Unlimited carried zero, and Scribd and Oyster weren't much better, offering only two of my ten books. The New York Public Library, on the other hand, had seven available:

I'm curious to see what the future of book streaming looks like. One of the early problems with Netflix was its sad offering of digital movies; now it's getting Emmy nominations for its original shows and it's expanded the film and TV selection over the years. So maybe this is just the start to Kindle Unlimited, and over time, its collection will grow (though hopefully not to the detriment of authors). In the meantime, the library looks like the best bet.

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